July 23, 2007

Dan Cameron

Nobody runs the art world. No one is in charge of what gets seen where, when, or in what context. Lots of different people may be in charge of separate details here and there, and there might even be overlap, but by and large they represent completely disparate interests. The most common reason for exercising one’s option to get involved with art is that one has developed a keen interest in it, to the point of its becoming a passion.

Art is the closest model we possess for the absolutely free mind permitted to work in real time and space, completely unfettered by authority. There are always limits, but the biggest limit of them all seems to be the human will, which balks at being able to do exactly what it wants to when it gets the urge. Perhaps that is really why we have artists: to symbolically enact all that freedom on our behalf. This responsibility does not end with the making of the work, but continues with its designation as ‘art’ – i.e., something worth looking at. It should surprise no one to learn that this authority also belongs to every single one of us.

Of course, one does occasionally hear that all the major decisions in the art world are in the hands of a small cabal of power brokers, but this hardly seems consistent with what one experiences with one’s own senses. In fact, if you look closely, art seems to be bursting out of every available seam, with little consensus on what gets presented where. It’s surprising, really, how little encouragement art requires, but perhaps that’s because more people find themselves wanting art, even in those cases where they don’t actually know what it is.